


Second Year, Steadier Now

by Merfilly



Category: The Fugitive (Movies)
Genre: Developing Relationship, Healing, M/M, dead wife mentioned, reference to 90s tech, set between the movies, which led to fun research, with respect
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-09
Updated: 2020-08-09
Packaged: 2021-03-03 21:47:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,350
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24832594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly
Summary: Richard's gotten back to work, and he's slowly moved into a relationship with a man who once said "I don't care" and meant it. Maybe their evolving toward something more.
Relationships: Samuel Gerard/Richard Kimble
Comments: 10
Kudos: 33
Collections: Rare Pairs Exchange 2020





	Second Year, Steadier Now

**Author's Note:**

  * For [simplecoffee](https://archiveofourown.org/users/simplecoffee/gifts).



> Author accepts suggestions for tags if any content is found to be in need of warning.

Two damned days straight at the hospital had left Richard too numb to do more than drop onto the couch, lean his head back… and pass out. Coming back around to an apartment that was fully dark around him when he didn't really remember actually making it home was disorienting.

Sitting perfectly still, just breathing and making his mind turn over events, like his therapist had suggested, actually helped. He remembered being asked to take on two extra surgeries, back to back, and then the accident had overloaded the emergency department, so of course he'd pitched in. He just wasn't as young as he'd once been, to pick up that much extra. A nap somewhere in there really hadn't been a good substitute for sleep.

He sat up a little as a muffled beeping told him he hadn't even gotten the pager off when he came in, though his wallet wasn't digging into his hip, nor his keys.

He checked the screen of the small annoyance, and saw '36' on it.

That cleared his mind further. The three was for 'SAM' and six was for 'GERARD', the code they'd decided on when Sam had decided he'd risk staying in touch.

_"Don't go thinking I'm sentimental, or anything."_

_"I know, I know, you don't care."_

For someone who hadn't cared, who lived his life as one job to the next, they'd had three dates in two different cities this past year, and Richard was pretty certain this might be the fourth. Unless…

…something was wrong. Richard got up and went to the phone, punching in the number he'd memorized for Sam's work phone.

"Gerard," came the answer, strong and crisp and somehow threatening violence if it was a telemarketer or other unwanted call.

"It's me."

"Going to be back in Chicago, day after tomorrow. Pick me up at the airport, four in the afternoon?"

"Sure thing, Sam."

"Gotta go."

The line went dead, and Richard hung his end up, before heading to get a shower.

He didn't feel so tired now, and felt like an absolute idiot for that fact. 

"Helen, I really think you'd like him," he told the framed picture of his wife in the hallway.

* * *

Four in the afternoon could be irritating, but Richard didn't let it get to him. Traffic was what it was, and the waiting at the airport actually wasn't as bad as it could have been. He kept his eyes peeled for the U.S. Marshal as he crept along at the passenger pick up… and he felt his breath catch.

Samuel Gerard, all six foot of him, in an honest-to-god tailored suit, tie still taut, professional suitcase off one hand, was a visual Richard had never expected to take in. This was more than business dress for court, and Richard half-wondered where Sam was coming from to be so crisp.

He stopped in front of the man, popping the trunk, and waiting for Sam to put the suitcase away, before he was joined in the car by the man that had, at some point in the two years since his desperate flight for justice, stolen his attention.

"All spiffed up?" Richard inquired as he merged back into traffic to leave.

Sam answered that by reaching up to loosen the tie. "Flew out straight from the monkey business so I could have more time to myself," Sam groused. "D.C. will always be a cesspool, but sometimes one of us has to go and try to convince idiots to spend at home instead of foreign affairs."

"I'd wondered, but… certainly not going to complain about the view it gave me," Richard said, gambling on flirtation. Sam looked his way, something he could see out of the corner of his eye, and then there was a chuckle.

"Pretty sure I'd be glad to have help getting out of it," were the next words, said like Sam had just invited him to a Bulls game or something else as mundane, but it made Richard's throat go dry.

"Your place then."

"Sure as hell too old to try these stunts on that narrow-ass bed you have at your place," Sam agreed.

Richard could feel the smile growing, and didn't regret it in the least.

* * *

Sam's place was clean, neat, and… unlived in, to Richard's way of thinking. Despite only having had his current apartment for a little more than a year now, Richard knew it showed all signs of him being there all the time he wasn't working. Sam's home, that he outright owned, felt almost pristine in comparison.

But, then again, ever since he and Sam had decided to try this dating thing, the dates had been so few in number more for lack of opportunity than anything else. Sam worked a hard job and was constantly gone for it.

"I know it's out of the way to where you wound up taking work," Sam said, as if divining Richard's thoughts on the matter, "but I wasn't kidding about having room for you, if you don't want to renew that insanely expensive lease."

"Something to think about," Richard told him, filing away that repeat of an offer he'd first heard after their second date.

It might have taken them that entire first year after the case against him closed to decided what they wanted, but Sam played for keeps in all things.

So much for not caring.

"Think I'm supposed to help you out of the suit, right?" Richard asked, rather than push at the bubble of actually wanting to risk sharing his future with a man who was at least half as amazing as his wife had been.

Sam chuckled and left the suitcase there before leading him back to the bedroom with a bed more than big enough for their desires.

* * *

Richard woke, the unfamiliar scent and sight of a room that had been new a few hours before filtering past the pleasant haze the aftermath of endorphin release. The arm around his middle was strong but relaxed, and the sound of breathing was evenly slow.

Would it be so hard to have this more often? Four dates in a year, and only a handful of meeting the year before that, most of them actually phone conversations wasn't a lot to base a relationship on. There'd been a movie playing in the hospital staff lounge a few weeks back, one of those action thrillers, and the protagonists had mentioned relationships built on stressful events weren't statistically likely to last.

Men who entered relationships late in life tended to stay in them, to counter that, a piece of his mind told him.

"You know, Doctor Kimble? You think too loud."

Richard rolled over at the sleep-gruff tones, and found Sam looking at him, doing that searching thing that meant he'd had his own thoughts on matters.

"There's a community hospital nearby, one that can't pay as well, but seems to always need surgeons," he said. "Might take me a bit to convince them I'm willing to take the cut."

Sam half-smiled. "Well, you've got a month at least on your lease."

"You really think this is the next step?" Richard asked seriously.

"We're not getting any younger, and I have to admit… it's nice to have someone to unwind with between hunts and escorts."

Richard sighed softly, knew it for contentment, and nodded. "Then we'll try it on, and see if it works."

"Sounds good. So does food."

"Do you cook?"

"When it suits me. I was thinking more of the greasy spoon diner not that far from here, though, always open, best pie in three states," Sam told him with a devilish smile. "Just no comments about my arteries clogging."

"Me? Comment on unhealthy eating habits in a man that lives on donuts and coffee?" Richard laughed after he said it, and got out of the bed, so they could clean up.

He wondered if he should count the diner as the fifth date, given their afternoon certainly counted for fourth.

Only, did it matter, when they were looking at a shared future now?


End file.
